Dashcam captures road blast that left 9 police, 1 civilian injured in Turkey (VIDEO)
Nine police officers and one civilian were injured in an attack allegedly carried out by the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) in Turkey on Thursday. A dashboard camera caught the dramatic moment a bomb exploded near a passing police bus in the Mardin province.
The white police bus was driving along the street when the bomb went off, forcing the vehicle to collide with a nearby truck in the middle of the traffic. Plumes of thick black smoke immediately filled the air, causing havoc throughout the area, the footage showed.
Another video shows a gigantic crater in the road, caused by the attack.
The bomb attack was carried out on Thursday night in the Nusaybin district of Mardin, southeast Turkey, newspaper Today’s Zaman reported. Those injured were taken to a local hospital. None of them is said to be in critical condition.
Tensions in Turkey escalated in July 2015 after at least 30 Kurdish activists, mostly students, were killed in a suicide blast in Suruc, a mainly Kurdish town on Turkey's Syrian border.
In August, the Turkish government launched a military operation in Kurd-majority areas, imposing curfews and clashing with fighters of the militant PKK, which is considered a terrorist organization in Turkey. At least 150 civilians and hundreds of fighters on both sides are thought to have died in the conflict. The crackdown was slammed by human rights groups as disproportionate and a form of collective punishment against the Kurds.
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Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said a total of 3,100 PKK militants and 200 security personnel were killed in clashes last year.
Earlier this week Amnesty International said Ankara is endangering as many as 200,000 people living in the areas affected by disrupting basic services, blocking their freedom of movement, and conducting firefights in residential areas.
